The Black
by ApacheTheWriter
Summary: One man's war.
1. Chapter 1

The Black

 **2552, Sol System, Earth**

The door was still glowing red as the marine kicked it. With a crash, the 4-inch titanium plate fell to the floor amidst the slag from the plasma cutter he had used to breach it. He activated his flashlight, and panned it around the interior of the Longsword. This fighter was in bad shape- plasma scoring along the entire left wing, the thruster gimbal looking like Swiss cheese. It and every other exo-asset in the fleet. In fact, while such recovery ops were usually performed after a battle had concluded, in the hopes of recovering bodies, this op in particular was, while not explicitly stated as such, obviously meant as a last ditch salvage run for potentially workable fighters.

To say nothing of the man-sized hole he had just cut in the sealed door.

As he entered, he fully expected to see the same thing he always saw- dead bodies. It was gruesome work he did. He still had not fully gotten used to the sight of corpses. He had only gotten out of basic 3 months ago, and had been attached to this cruiser ever since. CA-70, _UNSC Canberra_ , was the flagship of the 5th Fleet, attached permanently to Earth's defense, along with 7 others of it's kind and numerous frigates, destroyers, and carriers. Most of those had been turned to slag drifting aimlessly in space within the past few days and he was now standing on one of the last workable ships in the fleet, on the far side of the planet from the opposing covenant fleet, which was in the process of landing troops and destroying ground opposition, prepping the planet to be glassed like so many others. Fleet Admiral Harper continued coordinating ops with Lord Hood, who recently had to abandon _Cairo Station_ in favor of a frigate, _UNSC Forward Unto Dawn,_ as _Cairo_ and other orbital super MACs were overrun. The situation was looking more and more desperate, and while the fighting spirit was still high, rumors were spreading that the high command was soon to initiate contingency procedures, evacuating what people they could and hightailing it, either into deep space or to one of the remaining colonies. Even so, to what end? If the covenant got Earth, humanity was as good as extinct. After Reach, every major remaining military asset had been redeployed here. And now the majority of that was gone too. If Earth fell, all they could do is run.

He took a few cautious steps into the cabin of the Longsword. Just as he'd expected- two human corpses, their oxygen masks still attached to their faces. Crystalized blood covered the consoles and displays. One man had a large piece of shrapnel embedded in his torso. He cringed slightly, but stomached it and grabbed the men's dog tags. He noted that the cabin atmosphere had been vented manually and made for a computer terminal to pull the ship's black box.

The tell-tale sound of an M6 sidearm cocking snapped the marine out of his stupor. He looked up. A man, dressed in a tattered flight suit, was slumped over the pilot's controls. He shakily held the pistol, pointing it at the marine. The man drew a ragged breath, and spoke softly. "I thought you may have been one of those split-jaws, come to finish the job. Good to see you, Marine."

The marine hurried over, taking notice of the rank insignia on the man's uniform- Chief Petty Officer. He was Navy, which meant that the Marine did not technically report to him. All the same, he gave the wounded man every formality. The marine replied as he assessed the man's injuries. "No, sir, You're on the CA-70 _._ We recovered your fighter from the debris field."

"What's the date, Marine?"

"October 23."

The man chuckled a bit. "Three days. Three days I've been out there." He suddenly began coughing, blood splattering onto his flight suit.

The marine hastily retrieved a canister of Biofoam from the wall mounted med-cabinet but the man waved him away.

"It's too late for me now anyway. That foam shit will just make it hurt worse."

"Sir…"

"I don't want to hear it, Marine. Earth, what happened?"

"Heavy fighting still occurring in orbit and elsewhere, sir. We're suffering heavy losses and have resorted to guerilla hit-and-run tactics. And most of the orbital grid on the other side of the planet is wasted. Only a temporary lull in the fighting let us retrieve your fighter."

The man grimaced. "And to think it could have all been for nothing."

Choking up blood, the man motioned the young Marine to come closer.

The marine glanced back out into the expansive hangar bay. A large row of derelict fighters and escape pods had to be checked still.

It could wait. This man was dying.

"Yes sir?"

The man pushed himself back up into the Pilot's chair.

"I have something to tell you. Maybe it's not important in the scheme of things, seeing as how those bastards have now pushed us to the brink. But maybe you can take some meaning from it. And seeing how i'm not gonna leave this cockpit alive, there's nothing better to do than tell you my story..."


	2. Chapter 2

"My name is Frank Edward Morrison. I was born on March 13, 2515, on the colony of Tribute. That's eight years before these bastards showed their ugly faces and started glassing worlds. Growing up, I remember watching the Holonet in the kitchen of my father's high-rise penthouse, seeing reports of some kind of aliens that were taking our worlds. It was joked about in school, even. But they never made it sound as bad as it really was. As strange as it seems, my the war first became real for me when we could no longer buy Harvest Peaches, my favorite food, in the market. Casualty reports were always many thousands less than they actually were, and censorship ran rampant. The teachers didn't talk about it much- at least not until I was 18. By then there was an entire class devoted to war studies. I joined that as soon as it came out- I was as patriotic to the UNSC as they came. I suppose that was part of living in an Inner colony, but I loved formality and was immediately attracted to military service. The UNSC officer they had teach the class started being more realistic then about how the war was going, and that just set it in stone.

I'd been off-planet only once, to visit family on Reach when I was ten. As the shuttle lifted off from the Casbah starport and we entered space, I remember looking out in awe at the Eridani Fleet doing exercise, Hundreds of Frigates, Cruisers, and a single huge Supercarrier, thousands of Longsword fighters screaming around in the vacuum. I knew then that space, this exciting frontier, was for me. I enlisted the week after high school graduation, at just 18 years old, like so many others. And from the moment I placed my palm on the datapad at the recruiters office, my life would never be the same.

For basic training, I was to be relegated to Reach. Myself and the other "boots" arrived at Casbah Starport and were crammed into coach seating on the first commercial liner out of there. There was no need for Cryo on a trip that short, and so I spent the day and a half it took to get there, in between nervous sleep, researching our enemy and the war I was about to be thrown headfirst into.

The shuttle landed at the spaceport in New Alexandria, and I was promptly loaded on a Pelican with about 15 other recruits. We were given a quick crash course on how to stay conscious in high-G flight, and promptly lifted off and streaked over the city. I fought the darkness creeping in to my vision until; finally, we landed at Camp Gallagher in Eposz.

Three months passed there.. We did standard drills, PT, Zero-G maneuvering, and intensive studies in mathematics and science. And one by one, the class dwindled until just 30 of us remained. At that point, we began transitioning into individual evaluations.

One day I was called into a restricted-access building, flanked by two rough-looking Marine guards.

"Please step inside, Cadet. Someone will be in touch with you shortly."

I stepped inside the door and was immediately interested in what I saw- an array of instrumentation and screens. It was obvious that this was a flight simulator. I took a seat in the Pilot's chair. After a minute, a voice came on over an intercom- the crisp, but unmistakably artificial voice of Horvath, the base's Smart AI.

"Do you know where you are, Cadet?"

I swallowed. "The cockpit of a Longsword fighter. Or a simulation of one."

"Correct. Please take the control stick in your hand and turn your attention to the screen at 12 O'clock."

I did so.

"We are going to start you off with some basic flight simulation ops. Please accelerate the craft and maneuver to waypoint alpha."

I pushed the throttle forward and noticed the reactor readout heating up. Waypoint alpha was 3 Kilometers ahead. I reached it, and cut the thrusters.

"Now please maneuver to waypoint bravo."

Again, I moved the craft to the waypoint.

This went on for a while, the AI gradually stepping up challenges and explaining various other controls until the pilots chair started to feel like a second home. Finally, I noticed a strange purple object on the main screen.

"Cadet, please select the ASGM-10 missile and allow the computer to target the buoy."

I stiffened, but managed to key the anti-fighter missile on the weapons console, directing the computer to target the simulated object, ostensibly designed to resemble a covenant seraph fighter .

"Arm the missile and fire."

I keyed the missile codes and squeezed the trigger on the flight stick. On the screen, the missile left a ghostly plume of exhaust as it streaked towards the stationary fighter. The Covenant craft detonated in a ball of fire.

I felt a small triumph, but knew that in a real scenario, the enemy fighter would be dodging, maneuvering.. Firing back.

The AI gave me another series of tests. After only a few hours in the simulator, I could aileron roll, strafe an enemy fighter, they even gave me scenarios where I would do bombing runs on enemy capital ships. The pilots chair truly felt like a second home, and I could tell this was the career in the Navy that I wanted.

The AI eventually dismissed me back to the Chief and normal drills. The next morning, I was handed redeployment papers. Anchor 12, for basic flight training. I barely had time to be surprised, because I was herded onto a Pelican dropship bound for space.

Another high-G flight.

The pelican had no windows besides the thick, scratched plate of bulletproof polarized glass on the troop bay door. I watched as the clouds streaked past, until, finally, I was overcome with a feeling of weightlessness.

There was a sharp bump as the pelican touched down in a Landing bay. I heard a hiss as the bay repressurized. The troop bay door opened and I stepped out of the Pelican. I stood at attention and saluted the junior officer that came to meet me.

He returned the gesture, and then checked a clipboard.

"You are Cadet Frank Morrison?"

"Yes sir."

"Come with me, Cadet. I'll show you to your rack, you can drop off your luggage, and then I'll take you to your class."

We walked through the halls of the station, passing numerous people and doors, until we reached one that the officer opened. It was a small cubicle with a cot and a chest.

"This will be your quarters for the duration of your stay aboard. I will forward you the station schematic, along with your schedule" he gestured to the computer mounted to the wall.

We walked through the station for a half-hour, he showing me all the important locations, and the class that I'd be attending. Class started immediately after the tour. I stood at attention with 35 other cadets until the instructor, a captain in his 50's, strode in.

It was a similar drill to the one from basic back on Reach. After an introduction from Captain Peterson, for that was his name, he made it clear that, once again, we would receive no sympathy in this class.

"This class has an 85 percent wash-out rate" He'd said. "Look at the man next to you. Chances are, that man will not be a Fighter Pilot in the UNSC Navy."

I glanced at the man to my right. A scrawny kid with blonde hair, he looked nervous.

Weeks of instruction on the art of piloting a Starfighter followed, along with intensive studies in math and physical sciences. As Captain Peterson had said, most of the people I'd seen on the first day were gone within a few weeks. Soon, it was only me and 10 other people.

Eventually, there came a day where we got to pilot an actual training craft. It was only an SKT-13 Shuttlecraft, Which was a slow, ungainly craft, essentially an upscaled version of the Bumblebee lifeboat. I had 300 hours on the simulator on this point, and I was surprised that piloting the craft came almost natural to me.

And after a few more months of simulations, they finally let me at a fighter. We shuttled from Anchor 12 to the CVA-548, UNSC _Musashi_. The shuttle docked in the large hangar of the carrier, and from there we were assigned a Longsword, and a flight crew. My flight crew met me inside the cabin of the craft. On sys-ops was Cadet Campbell, a tall, skinny kid from Jericho VII, and on Coms was Cadet Rakowski from Mars. We shook hands, exchanged a few short introductions, and got settled into our stations.

I activated the craft's reactor, heating up the engines as I went through my Pre-flight check. All green.

"Criticality. engine heating up. Systems nominal, Comms"

Rakowski hit the com. " _Musashi,_ this is Trainer 1-4. Preflight green, all systems go. Permission to launch."

"Trainer 1-4, _Musashi CIC._ Cleared to launch, hold for the door."

"Cleared to launch, holding, Trainer 1-4"

The atmosphere in the hangar bay was sucked into massive vents and the expansive doors opened. I deactivated the electromagnetic landing gear of the longsword and teased the engines to guide the fighter out into the blackness of space. This was to be a simple operation, just a series of maneuvers, and a live-fire demonstration at the end. I accelerated to 20% reactor output and proceeded to Rally Point Alpha, just like in my first flight sim back on Reach. The other trainer flights had already cleared the _Musashi_ and were staged at the rally point, station keeping thrusters flicking occasionally. The exercise included maneuvering through an asteroid field, and then coordinated fire from the entire squadron would take out a rock that had been painted on our HUDs.


	3. Chapter 3

**2536**

Graduation from the Anchor 12 Flight officer training course came sooner than I had expected. I had my shiny new Ensign rank clipped to my collar and orders to Vice Admiral Kowalski's Battlegroup _Totem Lake_. The minute I stepped onto that ship, I began feeling like an ant in a city. The Air Wing stuck together, though, and my O-1 rank got me into the club, where I could drink and gossip with other pilots. As luck would have it, I joined the ship at the very beginning of the group's R-and-R cycle, and so was able to spend plenty of time groundside on Reach, bar-hopping in New Alexandria. But the fun ended soon after. One day I woke up and keyed my datapad for daily orders. It read:

UNITED NATIONS SPACE COMMAND TRANSMISSION 177574-45

ENCRYPTION CODE: RED

FROM: VICE ADMIRAL LEE KOWALSKI, COMMANDING OFFICER _UNSC TOTEM LAKE,\_ / (UNSC SERVICE NUMBER: 00475-24383-LK

TO: ALL CREWMEN, BATTLEGROUP _TOTEM LAKE_

SUBJECT: IMMEDIATE RECALL FROM LEAVE

ALL CREWMEN OF BATTLEGROUP _TOTEM LAKE_ ARE HEREBY ORDERED TO REPORT TO THE NEAREST GROUNDSIDE STARPORT FOR IMMEDIATE RECALL BACK TO YOUR SHIP.

I groaned audibly when I received that message, because I had some plans to hit a particular flip music club in the city that day. On the ride back into orbit, I found out just why we were being recalled. The atlas moons, a collection of colonies around the gas giant planet Atlas, were under attack by enemy forces. What was more disturbing, however, was that the Atlas moons were inner colonies. Never before had the Covenant hit so close to home. Their strikes had always been more confined to backwater colonies, mostly ag-worlds with populations under 50,000. But the moons had a combined population of over 4 million. High command was throwing everything to their defense, including us. As we settled into cryo-tubes for the month-long slipspace voyage to get there, all we could do was hope that there would still be something there to rescue.

As I awoke from the black depths of cryosleep, something felt off. And more than usual, because waking up from cryo is a horrible experience any way you put it. As I collapsed out of my pod and vomited into the grated floor designed for exactly that purpose, I was suddenly and violently thrown to the ground by an explosion. The red emergency lights flickered, and just then I heard the distinctive sound of _Totem Lake_ 's MAC Gun firing. That could only mean one thing- we had just dropped out of slipspace right into a warzone. I followed standard procedure, which was to immediately don my suit and sprint down the corridor towards the lift. I would need to go up three decks to reach the hangar, and I could only hope a bolt of plasma wouldn't detonate in my vicinity in the time it took to get there.

I was pants-shittingly scared, but also curious. This would be my first chance to put my skills to a real test, and the first encounter I'd have with the enemy. There was no chance for a tactical briefing, I just made it to my fighter and keyed the reactor start sequence. The Com and sys-ops officers were a man and woman I had never seen before, and this was not a great time for icebreakers. I would find out later that a hit to _Totem Lake_ s' ventral surface had wiped out the cryo bay my regular crew had been in. The first of many cruel reminders that I would receive that you can lose your life in an instant. As I accelerated out of the hangar bay door, I could see other ships in the group throwing out a serious point defense screen, 50mm slugs flashing in the vacuum of space like shooting stars. The entire battlegroup was synced, and on my HUD It would throw up the vectors of every ship's firing solutions, enabling me to not get destroyed by friendly fire. A large red bar and exclamation mark traced a line from a destroyer out into space, indicating it was about to discharge a MAC round. I followed the round as it streaked off into the blackness of space, and could just make out some specks in the distance. That must be the enemy. "Sys-ops, please magnify" I said. The specks were magnified on the screen and there they were. The bulbous shapes of the enemy vessels. The destroyer's MAC round impacted one, and a tremendous explosion obscured it from view. I silently cheered until I realized that the enemy vessel was not destroyed- or even damaged. The strange, alien energy shield took the brunt of the round and showed no sign of failing. In return, the ship generated two intensely bright, bulbous globs of what looked like pure hell- these were plasma torpedoes. I watched as they streaked across space towards the offending destroyer. The destroyer fired it's emergency thrusters, attempting to slide out of the way. But the torpedoes, like magic, simply altered their course to impact the destroyer on it's starboard side. I watched as the meters of Titanium-A armor, molecularly modified for maximum durability and heat resistance, boiled away and the atmosphere flooded out of the breach. The destroyer's engines sputtered and gave out, and the ship drifted uncontrollably through space. I thought about the hundreds of people that must have died in that instant, and what hell must be going on in there if anyone was still alive.

This disparity in power struck me greatly. And in that instant, I knew why we had thus far been fighting a losing war. That realization struck me even harder as I gazed out towards the looming, purple ball that was Atlas. The moons were tiny in comparison, but they were known for their fertility and temperate climate. In the pictures I had seen of them, they looked green and luscious, but as I gazed I could see one was glowing a sickly shade of red.

Glassing. We'd been briefed on this extensively. The covenant vessels would rain their plasma down on a planet until nothing was left alive. The moon of Hesperius had already suffered this fate, by the looks of it, and Pleione would soon follow. The combined fleet the UNSC had sent only comprised sixty-five ships, to the covenant's 20. But those were still losing odds. It took four of our ships to rival one of theirs, by all accounts. My tactical readout indicated several enemy ships destroyed, mostly smaller _CCS_ -class battlecruisers. But several of their heavy-duty _DDS_ -class destroyers remained, hurling plasma at us. And at the center of it all, one massive _CAS_ -class assault carrier, it's size magnitudes larger than anything we had, even the super-massive _Punic_ class supercarriers. I would find out later that Pleione was spared immediate glassing because the covenant had decided to land troops there, recovering a museum artifact in a week-long campaign. Can you believe that shit? They spent all that manpower and all those resources in pursuit of an old piece of rock. And after they recovered it, they burned Pleione right down to bedrock.

I snapped back to the present and gunned the reactor. My squadron was already formed up, skimming along _Totem Lake'_ s starboard side. I formed up with them and accelerated towards the enemy. The nimble longsword fighter closed the gap quickly, and within half an hour we were in fighting range.

"Katana squad, this is Katana Leader. Enemy squad at vector 453. You know the drill. Break formation on my mark."


End file.
